Social media abuse was directed at over 85% of men’s tennis players attracting engagement online in the past year, with the ATP blocking some 234,000 comments from reaching them or fans, the governing body said on Thursday.
The ATP based the findings on an analysis of more than 3.7 million comments across ATP and player social media channels by its Safe Sport initiative, which uses AI-enabled moderation and specialist threat assessment.
It said more than 284,000 abusive comments were identified, and over 82% of them were removed in real time. During its first year, the programme identified and hid upwards of 162,000 comments containing “severe” abuse.
“Player welfare sits at the heart of the ATP’s safeguarding work,” said Andrew Azzopardi, the ATP director of safeguarding.
“Preventing more than 234,000 abusive comments from reaching
players and fans demonstrates the tangible impact the programme
is having every day. Online abuse has no place in tennis.
“We will keep investing in the technology, expertise and
partnerships that protect players, and we will continue working
with the authorities to hold those responsible to account.”
Tennis players, like many athletes, often have to deal with
the wrath of anonymous abusers online, many of whom are bettors,
with French player Gael Monfils humorously hitting back at some
of them following an early defeat in Stuttgart last year.
Monfils, 40, said at the time he was surprised people still
put money on him to win against much younger opponents.
Online abuse is not confined to angry gamblers, with
American Coco Gauff saying earlier this month she received an
“insane” amount of racist abuse at the China Open, prompting
condemnation from the United Nations Human Rights Office.
World Tennis, the WTA, the All England Club and the United
States Tennis Association have launched monitoring services that
use a combination of artificial intelligence and open-source
data to help protect players.
The French Open has also made AI-powered software available
for players to block online harassment and hate speech.
Source: Khaleej Times